JHill

It’s amazing the amount of buzz that podcasting’s been getting in the past few weeks. Doug Kaye’s ITConversations has seemed to get lost in the shuffle… He’s been offering great content for at the least the past year.

He hit the nail on the head by offering versions of their shows in Apple’s AAC format. The time that I have to listen to some of this great stuff is typically shorter than the files. AAC files save state, or where you left off. I understand the desire to keep this in relatively open file formats (MP3), but on the iPod, AAC files are much more useful.

If you’re not familar with the whole podcast thing, it’s basically just radio shows, typically by bloggers, in a digital format, but it’s caught on recently thanks to some tools that automate the download through RSS enclosures and then automatically add the files to your iTunes playlists. I’ve been using the iPodder javascript, which works well, but is no longer being developed. There are a bunch of other tools available.

On a related note, I had the misfortune of ordering Griffin’s RadioShark on the same day as a Slashdot post, so I’m sure that I’m backordered until spring. The RadioShark is an FM receiver that allows you to schedule the recording of FM broadcasts, which are saved as MP3 and added to your iTunes playlists.